NEW ORLEANS, La. (3/1/14) – Arkansas State University’s Sharika Nelvis is now a three-time recipient of the Sun Belt Conference (SBC) Women’s Most Outstanding Indoor Track Athlete Award after being selected by the league’s coaches in an announcement made Friday (Feb. 28) by the conference office.

Nelvis, a senior, earned top honors in all four events competed in at the 2014 SBC Indoor Track and Field Championships held earlier this week (Feb. 24-25) at Birmingham, Ala. Nelvis registered first-place showings in the 60-meter dash (7.28), 60-meter hurdles (8.04), 200-meter dash (23.50), and the long jump (19-05.46/5.93m) en route to garnering the conference meet’s top scorer with 40 points.

The Memphis, Tenn., native helped A-State to a third-place finish at the 2014 SBC Championships with a 78.5 points total. WKU’s Jessica Ramsey was recognized as the Women’s Most Outstanding Indoor Field Athlete and her teammate, Sandra Akachukwu, was named the Women’s Most Outstanding Freshman. Erik Jenkins of WKU was tabbed as the SBC Women’s Coach of the Year.

With the four event titles, Nelvis increased her championship title count to 12 in indoor competition. A four-time (2011-14) first-team All-SBC performer, Nelvis claimed conference women’s most outstanding indoor track recognition in the previous two indoor seasons (2011-12 and 2012-13) by registering the highest points output in the conference meet. Nelvis was recognized as the 2011 SBC Indoor Track’s Most Outstanding Freshman and is an eight-time (2012-2, 2013-3, 2014-3) SBC Indoor Track Athlete of the Week Award winner.

Nelvis presently is listed third on the 2013-14 NCAA-I Indoor Qualifying list in the 60-meter hurdles (8.03) while ranking tied for seventh place in the 60-meter dash (7.28) and 16th in the 200-meter dash (23.50). Her three national qualifying performances also represent the best marks in the Sun Belt Conference to date.

Arkansas State is currently ranked 49th nationally in the latest USTFCCCA Computer Rankings as of Feb. 24 with a 14.72 score and is listed 13th in the NCAA’s South Central Region Rankings.